


Something Nice

by helsinkibaby



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Het, Romance, Slice of Life, The Lying Detective spoilers, non canon relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-14
Updated: 2017-01-14
Packaged: 2018-09-17 12:57:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9324707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby
Summary: After leaving Culverton bloody Smith in the interrogation room, all Greg wants to do is go home. There, he finds two ladies in need of his attention.





	

**Author's Note:**

> getlestrade had this post on tumblr - 
> 
> _someone please write a fic about Greg going round john’s to comfort him but finding Molly and helping her and getting to hold the baby and feel like a dad and Molly loving the way he looks with a baby and them talking and getting really close and it could even lead to sexy times but please I just need it gahh_
> 
> I changed it a little but this is the fic that was inspired by this post. Doubtless it will be Jossed tomorrow so let's get that under the wire, shall we?

Greg knows Molly's close to waking when he hears a slight shift in her breathing, hears the sofa creak as she shifts against it. He doesn't say anything, just continues about his business, waits until he hears the sharp intake of breath that signifies her waking up properly, until he hears the sofa creak again and he sees the top of her head appearing above the cushions. She turns to look in his direction, a genuine smile lighting her face when she sees him and he feels a smile coming to his own lips in return. Quite the miracle after today, he thinks - sitting in that room with Culverton bloody Smith, he thought he'd never smile again. 

"What time is it?" she asks, rubbing her eyes as she stands and stretches. It makes her pyjama top - something pale and worn with faded cats that look like Toby - ride up, exposes a sliver of her stomach to his gaze and he doesn't even try to hide his fixation with it. 

"Half past probably too late to come over," he admits when she catches what he's doing and pulls down the top. "I let myself in, didn't think you'd mind." He gestures with the fork in his hand to the various cartons and containers scattered around her kitchen table. "I stopped for some food on the way here, didn't get a chance to get dinner. Wasn't sure if you had either, so I ordered plenty." 

"It smells lovely." She walks towards him - not that it takes her long, her flat's not exactly spacious - and kisses him on the cheek as she passes him. Which, frankly, is nowhere near enough after the day he's had so with his free hand he catches her by the wrist, pulls her against him gently and kisses her properly. 

He tries not to notice how thin her wrist is in his grasp, how she's still losing weight she couldn't afford to lose in the first place. But he's a detective, for all he's not Sherlock bloody Holmes, and he does notice. He knows better than to say it though. Instead, he just rests his forehead against hers when he pulls back, says, "Eat up before it goes cold." 

He'd left a plate out for her, knife and fork too, and he hears them clink against each other, hears the containers rattle as he grabs the beer he'd left on the table and pads into the sitting room, drops down gratefully on the couch. He wolfs the first few bites down so inelegantly that he's actually glad she's across the room rather than beside him and watching him. In fact he's so intent on eating the frankly delicious food as quickly as he can that he doesn't hear her say his name at first. When it registers with him, he turns his head, sees her looking not at him, but at the cardboard containers. 

"You said you got food on the way."

He frowns as he nods and swallows all at once. "Yeah."

"These are from Zhang's." He nods again and she turns, looks at him. There's the tiniest of frowns creasing her face, like she's worked something out but she still can't quite understand it. "Zhang's isn't on the way here. Zhang's is ten minutes in the other direction from your office." 

Which is perfectly true. It also happens to be Molly's favourite takeout spot, his too, the one they usually call into when they're at his place, because it's the nearest one to his flat. There are actually any amount of places he could have gone to that would have resulted in him getting her more quickly but his day had been shit and Molly's not much better and she's been running herself ragged for weeks between work and Rosie and Sherlock and he'd thought it would make her smile. 

"Yeah," he says simply, with a shrug. "I just wanted us to have something nice." 

Molly swallows hard, looks down for a second before she throws a wobbly smile at him. There's something distinctly watery about her expression as she lifts her plate, comes over to sit on the sofa beside him. She kisses him on the cheek again before she spears a spring roll and he lets her eat the whole thing before he speaks again. 

"I thought you might be in bed already." 

She shakes her head. "Rosie's in the travel cot." He'd seen the baby bag on one of the kitchen chairs so he'd guessed that much. "I didn't know if you'd come over but I thought I'd wait up a bit, just in case..." Her voice trails off and he puts a forkful of egg fried rice into his mouth so that he won't chide her for falling asleep on the couch yet again. "Was it awful?" 

Greg's been a copper for a long time, has seen a lot of bad men, has stood toe to toe with evil. He's rarely been as repulsed as he was today. It's so bad that he doesn't even want to talk to Molly about it, doesn't want to bring the horror of that interrogation room into her home. "Worse," he says simply. "I thought he might not confess, that he'd cry entrapment? Complete opposite." A long swallow of beer does nothing to wash the taste of bile from his mouth. "Word vomit, it was. Name after name after name..." He shudders and she shifts slightly on the couch, pressing her tiny body closer to his. He can feel the warmth of her through his shirt and her pyjamas and he closes his eyes, draws a deep breath and lets that warmth soothe his frazzled nerves. "And I have to do it all again tomorrow." The thought makes him want to go to bed, pull the covers over his head and forget the world. Instead, he looks down at her, studies her face carefully. "How are you?" 

Pressing her lips together, Molly's nostrils flare. "He did all that... the drugs, everything... on purpose?" John had told her some of the details over the phone, Greg knows, when he'd called her to ask her to keep Rosie that night. He knows a few more, and he will tell her, he will, but not at this hour of the morning, not when she looks like she's holding on by a thread. 

"Yeah," is all he says. Then, after a moment, "Crazy git." 

The words surprise a noise that's somewhere between a laugh and sob out of Molly and it's his turn to lean into her a little, letting his shoulder knock against hers. She looks up at him, eyes more than a little wet now and he hates, hates, hates, hates even more than Culverton bloody Smith, he hates seeing her cry. He reaches out, cups her cheek in his hand, leans down to kiss her -

\- And a cry from the bedroom makes them both jump.

"Rosie," Molly says, like he hadn't worked that much out. Her eye falls to the clock on the mantelpiece. "She'll be wanting her bottle-"

She makes to stand but Greg stops her with one hand on her knee. "I'll go." He pops the last bit of sweet and sour chicken into his mouth, chews it as he points at her still half full plate. "You're still eating." He says it through a mouthful of food and usually she'd chastise him for that. She says nothing, just scoops up a forkful of rice and gives him a tiny smile. 

Deciding to take that as a win, he makes his way to the bedroom. The travel cot is wedged into the corner, the bedside lamp at the other end left on to cast some light into the room. Rosie is still crying in the travel cot, arms and legs waving furiously and Greg scoops her up easily, rests her chin on his shoulder and rubs her back. She stops crying almost straight away but she fusses a little bit at first and he grins to himself, knowing that he's not her first choice, maybe not even her second or third. "It's ok, Rosie-posie," he says to her. "It's just Uncle Greg... I know I'm not as pretty as Aunty Molly, but you'll just have to make do with me for a few minutes, OK?" Her little hand makes a fist in his shirt and he takes that as a win too. "I know you're hungry, can't blame a girl for that... Don't think you'll have any of our takeaway though... let's see what Aunty Molly has out here, shall we?" 

Still rubbing her back, he goes back to the living room and his copper's eye doesn't miss the fact that while Molly's still sitting on the sofa, it's in a slightly different position. "Her bottle's warming up," she says. He lifts one eyebrow and her cheeks darken as she gives him a slightly cheeky smile. "I'm still eating." She holds up her plate and there's definitely less there than there was a few minutes ago. "I can chew and heat a bottle at the same time, you know."

Wisely, he decides to say nothing, but when she holds out her hands to take Rosie from him, he shakes his head. "Oh no, you don't, Aunty Molly, not so fast." Rosie lifts her head from his shoulder and he looks down at her, makes a funny face that makes her coo. "I've been looking forward to this all day." 

Molly looks almost affronted. Almost, because her lips are twitching. "You mean I'm not the only reason you came over here?" 

Greg pretends to consider it. "Well, you're the most important," he finally concedes and she laughs at that. Definitely a win, he thinks. 

There's a beep from the kitchen then so he crosses the room, extracts the bottle from the machine, flips off the top and tests the temperature on his wrist, managing to do all of the above while still keeping a hold on Rosie. Deciding that the bottle is fine - maybe a tiny bit on the cool side but the way she's starting to fidget, he doesn't think it'll be an issue - he goes back to sit down beside Molly, puts the bottle to the baby's lips and grins as she starts sucking right away. 

He concentrates on her for a few minutes, making sure her head isn't too low or too high, that she's not drinking the bottle too fast. Her big blue eyes are locked on his face which makes it easy not to look away and he only does it when he hears Molly's voice, very soft and low. "You're really good with her." He shoots a grin in her direction, sees her looking curiously at him. "You'd be a great dad," she says and it's his turn to blush. "Did you ever think about it... with your wife?"

He's surprised she's bringing it up because they don't usually discuss his marriage, not because of any pain or hurt, simply because it's water long since under the bridge. "We talked about it," he says. "But it was never the right time, you know? My job, her job, we could just never be on the same page with it. Then of course, there was the cheating..." He shrugs. "She brought it up. The last time. But I knew... Well, not that I knew things weren't going to work out, I still hoped they would. But until I knew for sure, there was no point bringing a kid into the middle of it. Then there was that Christmas party..." Sherlock's voice, "The PE teacher," rings in his head but it's easy to replace the memory of that hurt with a different memory of that night, the first time he'd ever really noticed Molly, the night he'd begun to think of her in a completely different way. "It all went to hell pretty quickly after that." She knows all that, so he doesn't rehash it. "And it just seemed pointless to wish for something I'd never have." 

Sitting up, she places her now empty plate on the coffee table on top of his. Turning back to him, her hand lands on his shoulder, rubs the same way he'd rubbed Rosie's back. "It's not too late," she tells him and he grins at her. 

"Something you want to tell me?" 

He's teasing and she knows it, he knows from the way she shakes her head, rolls her eyes. "No... but I think about it. Sometimes." Her gaze drops to Rosie, just for a second and he wonders if this is one of those times. "Do you-"

"All the time." He wants to hold her hand but he can't, not when feeding Rosie, so he settles for leaning in to her, knocking his shoulder against hers. "But call me old fashioned if you like, but I think we've a couple of steps to go before we get to that point." He looks down at her left hand, specifically the fourth finger, imagines not for the first time a set of rings there. "If that's all right with you." 

Molly smiles as she shifts on the sofa, moving so that she can lay her head against his shoulder. "I'd like that." Her voice is so quiet he can barely hear it and when he glances down at her, he can see that her eyes are heavy and starting to shut. 

"Go to sleep," he says as he brushes a kiss to the top of her head. "Hopefully you'll have something nice to dream about." 

He hears her take a deep breath, let it out slowly before she whispers two words that make his heart skip a beat. 

"I do." 

Grinning, he leans back on the sofa and she leans back with him and in short order, the only sounds in the flat are Molly's deep and even breathing and Rosie's sucking on the bottle. 

Yes, Greg thinks to himself. He could definitely get used to this.


End file.
